Update on New Business Items at the NEA meeting in NOLA

[Catshrink]

New Business Item 1
Substitute Adopted
NEA will prepare and launch a positive social media platform that will be aimed at reviving public confidence in public school employees and public education while countering misperceptions about our profession and what we represent. This platform will serve to educate the public on the pitfalls educators face.


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New Business Item 2
Adopted
While the National Education Association Representative Assembly supports and appreciates the significant increase in federal funding for education, the NEA takes a position of no confidence in the US Department of Education's Race to the Top competitive grant policies and guidelines, the use of competitive grant policies and guidelines as a basis for the reauthorization of ESEA, and similar initiatives and policies that undermine public education.



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New Business Item 3
Adopted
NEA through its regular communications vehicles will keep its members informed of legislative, judicial and other developments regarding the status of ethnic studies courses in Arizona and elsewhere;

NEA will review and publicize research on the positive impact and the social and academic value of ethnic studies programs which help students develop a pride in their own cultural legacy and embrace the ideas embodied in the history and culture of their neighbors.

NEA will, as appropriate, participate in coalitions and otherwise support efforts to ensure that ethnic studies curricula, which are in keeping with NEA Resolutions, are protected and, where possible, expanded and widely available;

NEA will continue to provide legal analysis to affiliates regarding legislation and/or regulations which restrict ethnic studies programs, and, where appropriate, will support litigation and offer other organizational support to prevent restrictions which would be contrary to NEA Resolutions.

Specifically, NEA will work in partnership with the Arizona Education Association and the Tucson Education Association to analyze Arizona HB 2281 ("prohibited courses; discipline; schools") to determine if a legal challenge "on its face" or "as applied" may be successful and provide the appropriate legal or organizational support.


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New Business Item 6
Adopted As Modified
NEA leaders will seek communication with AFT leadership reaffirming the Jurisdictional Agreement between NEA and AFT which states (in section: D. Membership 1): "with or without a state-level Jurisdictional Agreement" neither organization will promote "reduced dues to members of the other organization as an inducement to join and will not provide any forms or instruction for withdrawing membership from the other organization."

The NEA message shall include a recommendation that AFT communicate with the Alabama AFT affiliates to respect and obey the terms of the NEA/AFT Jurisdictional Agreement.


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New Business Item 7
Adopted
NEA will develop, in partnership with pertinent organizations, a cost-effective informational program/campaign to enlighten retired and post-middle aged populations about the negative effects of cuts to public education on the economic viability, national security, and public safety of the United States of America.


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New Business Item 9
Adopted
NEA will, through its existing channels and in conjunction with the Health Information Network (HIN), educate members about Human Papilloma Virus (HPV) and how it can lead to cervical and anal cancer and how it can be prevented and tested.


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New Business Item 10
Referred to the Appropriate Committee
NEA will define unequivocally what the word "public" means in the term "public eduction" as written in its vision, mission, and describing its core values of equal opportunity, achieving a more just society, and sustaining a democratic form of government.


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New Business Item 11
Defeated WTF????
NEA will organize a campaign to inform teachers and public about the privatization of public schools and how it undermines democracy. This campaign will include but not limited to characteristics, theoretical foundation, effects in practice, comparative study of public and private systems in the world, social, legal, and economic implications for teachers, curriculum and communities.


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New Business Item 12
Defeated
NEA will work with student, community, and labor organizations (including NEA affiliates) to organize and lead a national day of action to protect and improve public education on October 7, 2010. The actions will include locally and regionally initiated rallies, marches, and, where possible, work stoppages, nationwide. NEA's publicity campaign for the day of action will focus on the need to do the following: (1) restore all cuts to public education and other services, (2) tax corporations to fully fund public education and other services, and (3) demand federal policy that prioritizes human needs over corporate profits.


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New Business Item 13
Adopted As Amended
The National Education Association President or his/her designee shall lay a wreath at the Tomb of the Unknowns at Arlington National Cemetery during American Education Week.


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New Business Item 14
Defeated
We direct the NEA to encourage state and local Associations to develop programs that support ethnic studies in K-Higher Education. Also to create an activity during October 2010 to reinforce the importance of how ethnic studies curriculum help to promote a better understanding of people throughout our country, i.e., read-a-thon, speaker, assembly, art show, teach-in.


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New Business Item 15
Adopted
The National Education Association will publicly, through regular channels, support and re-affirm the National Education Association's policy on charter schools and the National Education Association's resolution A-32: Acceptable Charter Schools and other non-traditional public school options when discussing the Elementary and Secondary Education Act Re-Authorization and the Race to the Top Program.


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New Business Item 16
Referred to the NEA President
NEA will inform its members about Irlen Syndrome/Scotopic Sensitivity, a brain-based visual perception condition that adversely affects a significant portion of school children and their families, impacting not only academic performance but also quality of life. Information will be disseminated widely through various NEA publications, including NEA Today, and will contain a thorough explanation of the condition - symptoms, method of remediation, and a summation of peer-reviewed research.


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New Business Item 17
Defeated
NEA will organize an educators march on Washington, D.C. to highlight the frustration surrounding NCLB, ESEA Reauthorization, Race to the Top, and the constant anti-teacher rhetoric in the name of public education reform. That march will be scheduled on the weekend of the October NEA Board of Directors meeting.

The NEA will work with coalition partners such as AFT, PTA, other national unions, political leaders, state and local boards of education, administrators, superintendents, etc. NEA will take the lead in organization, logistics (march permits, parking arrangements, etc.), publicity, and follow-up activities.

NEA will provide a mechanism for collecting and distributing donations and other resources to assist states and/or locals with the costs.


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New Business Item 18
Adopted As Modified
NEA will review existing research literature to investigate the relationship between K-6 students’ age at school entrance, behavior issues/truancy, and his/her potential to graduate from high school.
NEA will report its findings to the Board of Directors no later than the last regularly scheduled NEA Board of Directors’ meeting prior to the 2011 NEA-RA.


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New Business Item 19
Adopted As Modified
Utilizing existing resources, the NEA shall use available data and research to determine the correlation of family economic conditions and their impact on student educational achievement. This study shall compile pertinent data and research that truly reflect the economic conditions of American families and educational attainment of their students.
The results, theories and conclusions will then be made available to NEA members and others through existing means.

Note: I deleted some procederal items but they are available at link:

http://www.nea.org/grants/33354.htm

[femmocrat]

1. Item 17--- Is the March on DC still going to take place?

It was defeated. As was #12 = "National Day of Action". NEA is so conservative when it comes to demonstrating.

I would attend a march in/on DC if there were buses going from our area.

[Catshrink]

3. And they defeated the item on informing the membership about privatization.

Let's just keep our heads in the sand and everything will be okay. Morans.

[Hannah Bell]

6. Gee, & here today I read some blogger saying "The NEA gets it".

The largest union’s meeting opened here on Saturday to a drumbeat of heated rhetoric, with several speakers calling for Mr. Duncan’s resignation, hooting delegates voting for a resolution criticizing federal programs for “undermining public education,” and the union’s president summing up 18 months of Obama education policies by saying, “This is not the change I hoped for.”

“Today our members face the most anti-educator, anti-union, anti-student environment I have ever experienced,” Dennis Van Roekel, president of the union, the National Education Association, told thousands of members gathered at the convention center here.

http://perdidostreetschool.blogspot.com/2010/07/nea-gets-it.html



Except they're not going to inform their membership about privatization, & they're not going to support a national action.

"The powerful teachers' union"!

[proud2BlibKansan]

7. In some respects they do get it

And in some respects AFT gets it too. I am doing a workshop at our convention on Merit Pay and RttT. The best research I have for my presentation came from a weekend of training I had from AFT. Of course that doesn't negate Randi playing footsie with Rhee and Duncan. But let's remember that unions are the members, not just the leadership. And if you could see my email inbox you would see dozens of emails every day from members who are just as angry as we are.

The power lies with the members, not the leadership.

[Catshrink]

8. But no whining...

:evilgrin:

I am so sick of armchair educators.

[proud2BlibKansan]

10. I hear you

I'm sick of the whining from the non members. They have more questions than the members! When I told one not long ago that he should join the union, he said as soon as the union negotiates a decent raise for him he would become a member. :wow:

But my larger beef lies with the American Idol watching teachers who are clueless to the crap we are facing. These are the idiots who said "AWESOME!" when they heard Bill Gates was speaking at the convention.

[Catshrink]

11. Yeah, I know what you mean.

I was sending informational emails to our local members so they would know about what's going on. After my email on Central Falls, several people asked me to take them off the list. They don't want to know. They want to stay in their nice little cocoons. Most of the resisters are the elementary teachers. Their stance may change now that their little world was rocked - since seniority is only one of the factors we're allowed to consider in riffing, two teachers, 15 & 20 year veteran teachers at one of our elementary schools, were riffed. Or maybe they'll just go back to sleep.

Whining - DU?

[mzteris]

4. nope. Only "locally organized" ones. n/t

[mzteris]

2. The most disturbing thing on there - Item 14

Defeated...

We direct the NEA to encourage state and local Associations to develop programs that support ethnic studies in K-Higher Education. Also to create an activity during October 2010 to reinforce the importance of how ethnic studies curriculum help to promote a better understanding of people throughout our country, i.e., read-a-thon, speaker, assembly, art show, teach-in.


:wtf: indeed.

[femmocrat]

5. Yes, I thought that one was odd, too.

I wonder what the rationale was for defeating that one.

[mzteris]

9. just out of curiousity -

does anyone know what the ethnic percentages are in teaching? - or the statics for all "groups" for that matter.

How many:
AA
Hispanic
Asian
bi- or multi-racial
men
gays
lesbians
trans

What is the age breakdown? 23-30, 30-40, 40-50, 50-60.....

Religious breakdown? Would there be any record of that?
Muslims
Jews
Christians
Atheists/Agnostics


Surely the Unions have some of these stats on record? Anyone??

[Hannah Bell]

12. i know that school deform 86-d mostly black teachers in new orleans & chicago.

[jody]

13. Conspicuous by its absence is recognizing teachers who are in the front lines and through whom every

improvement must come.

I would have written instead:

NEA will prepare and launch a positive social media platform that will be aimed at reviving public confidence in TEACHERS and other public school employees and public education while countering misperceptions about our profession and what we represent. This platform will serve to educate the public on the pitfalls educators face.